“ This is probably the best tool for generating brand awareness, trust, relationship building, and establishing expertise and credibility within an industry.” – Lisa Shorr
“ This is probably the best tool for generating brand awareness, trust, relationship building, and establishing expertise and credibility within an industry.” – Lisa Shorr
Shorr was looking for a better way to connect with clients, so she wrote a workshop on cybersecurity and started giving webinars and then later, lunch and learns. Then she branched out to rotary clubs, local chambers of commerce, and industry association meetings.“ What I would suggest are first do a webinar and see what kind of response you get, but also it allows you to practice your material,” says.“ Be a podcast guest because that helps to practice your speaking.”
Similarly, Kirkendoll says he got started by putting together abstracts for topics conferences were looking for, practicing on webinars, and building up his reels so event managers can see how he speaks.
Getting on the Speaking Circuit
Start by targeting your audience. Whether you serve law firms, automobile dealers, building management, worship organizations, or some other vertical, join industry associations and seek out member meetings and conferences.
“ We want to be where their members are and we ' re seen as that authority because not only do we understand their pains and struggles, we’ re also in the trenches with them,” Kirkendoll says.
Many of those professionals need continuing education credits, he adds,“ so they ' re looking for an authority.” At one Building Owners and Managers Association( BOMA) event, he presented on how AI works in building operations and management.“ Then I get a chance to have access to 250 people that were potential clients in the room,” Kirkendoll says.
For the industry organizations you belong to,“ always, always ask to speak, not just sponsor the event and have a table,” recommends Shorr.
Typically, industry conferences and events put out a call for papers or call for submissions. When you submit, Shorr says, be mindful of the deadlines and get to know who the event managers are.“ There ' s always a committee who helps to determine what topics get selected and you want to make sure that you ' re tailoring that description to that audience,” she says.
Shorr adds,“ It ' s important to really think about what you want to say, who you want to say it to. Take that time, just like preparing for a cloud migration for a client. You spend time researching the network, putting together a plan, discussing it with your service delivery team, and then discussing it with clients. You want to take that same kind of methodology with public speaking.”
Fippin agrees.“ Knowing your audience as intimately as possible is key. I want to study the associations or organizations or leaders that I ' m speaking to and what matters to them, what moves them, what impacts them, what is the best value for them content wise. And make sure that value is reaching the majority of the audience.”
Putting Together Your Presentation
Once you nail down a speaking engagement, Rendall recommends following a QQSS formula for your content: quotes, questions, stories, and statistics.“ You ask people questions. You share quotes for credibility. You tell stories. And then you use statistics for the people who are skeptical that your story was just an anecdote,” Rendall says.
Create your PowerPoint slides with four or five bullet points in mind that you want to cover, Shorr adds, preferably more visual than text-heavy. Then she recommends practicing in front of a sounding board, such as your peer accountability group or during a staff meeting.
Know your material, but don’ t memorize it word for word, advises Fippin, who sometimes practices in a mirror to get a feel for what is and isn’ t working.“ I try to have a couple key highlights and notes that I ' m remembering and then telling stories and anecdotes.” She follows Rendall’ s QQSS formula.
“ Practice, practice, practice, and then just be yourself,” Kirkendoll says.“ Don ' t be robotic about it. I like to tell jokes. I like to have a conversation. Tell a story.”
And most important, teach, don’ t sell.“ When you ' re on stage, it ' s not about promoting our business; it ' s about educating them on the topic and proving myself as the expert in that topic,” Kirkendoll says.
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